on the east side of town
with an entourage of cats,
an arsenal of guns,
a carousel of celebrity guests.
Rumor circulated 'round the English Department
that he frequented The Bottleneck bar.
One November afternoon, I spotted him there,
crouched alone in a corner,
pressed herringbone suit,
hickory-sword cane tap-tap-tapping to the music.
Our bartender whispered that he drank tequila,
so I purchased two shots and approached.
"Pardon me, Mr. Burroughs.
I am just a B-I-G admirer of your writing.
May I offer you a tequila?"
"Why, certainly, young man."
We tossed back our shots.
I retrieved the glasses, and he eyeballed me
with his steely, cobalt eyes.
I fell into a trance waiting for him to blink:
These are eyes that starred downthe barrel of a revolverpointed at his wife's cranium (pow!),eyes that peered unflinchinglyinto a drug-crazed abyss,eyes that crawled like insects
over young male bodies.
The band lurched into a new song
as a curiosity stirred in my groin,
crept up my spine:
Is this old queen expecting a come-on?!
I hoped to impress the Godfather of the Beats
with tales of imagined literary exploits,
regale him with an irreverent anecdote.
Instead, I stood before the man an imbecile,
barely mustering an oafish smile,
which he met—bless him—with a kindly grin
that pierced my anxious fever.
I retreated to the bar.
"How did it go?" the bartender asked.
"Oh, brilliant ... Yeah ...
One for the memoires."
And some say it was William Burroughs,
not Thomas Lambert,
who brought the literary bona fides
to Lawrence, Kansas.
**First published in Fjords Review
